Mayawati’s plan for new district including Amethi okayed

Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Mayawati was Wednesday allowed by the Supreme Court to create a new district including Amethi parliamentary constituency represented by Congress general secretary Rahul Gandhi, a lawyer said here.

“Since one bench (of Allahabad High Court) had already dismissed a petition seeking stay on Amethi’s renaming and declaration as district, the division bench had no business to entertain another petition on the same issue,” the ruling Bahujan Samaj Party’s national general secretary Satish Chandra Misra said, quoting an apex court bench.

Misra, who represented the state government in the hearing, said the apex court set aside a stay granted by the high court against the creation of the new district.

Amethi would continue to remain part of the state’s 71st district, christened as Chattrapati Shahuji Maharaj Nagar.

The new district has been named after BSP icon Chattrapati Shahuji Maharaj, the erstwhile ruler of Kolhapur.

The Mayawati government’s decision on creating a new district was stayed by the high court exactly two weeks ago.

The apex court bench comprising Justice R.V. Raveendran and Justice H.L. Gokhale said the stay granted by the Lucknow bench of the high court was against judicial propriety, Misra told IANS, shortly after his return from Delhi.

Activists of the ruling Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) in Uttar Pradesh celebrated the legal victory for the government.

“It’s a big victory for the chief minister, whose only intention was to give Amethi a higher status in view of popular demand of the local population,” Misra said.

“We are going to give Amethi what the Gandhis failed to do in so many decades,” he said.